swaggymama
Active member
Hi all... the family and I just recently set ourselves up to hopefully raise rabbits for meat.
We live in the suburbes, so it's kind of...well... hush hush and on the down lo, because technically, it's not 100%.
In any case - at the end of the day, we have a variety of different hutches that my husband built from scratch, which are insulated etc... the rabbits permanent homes, they're to be kept outdoors only.
(unless of course, something happens where their basic health and safety requires them to be kept indoors for a time...)
We currently have 3 flemish giant does, and 2 mini rex bucks.
My husband heard me say "rex"... I meant standard... he was sweet, he went to pick them up for me... got 2 mini rex bucks instead. They're less than a 1/4 of the size... how's that even going to work?? :lol: :lol:
My loving dum dum. :lol: :lol:
So - we're at the point right now where we're well enough set up that we're looking to start actually breeding them now.
1) Has anyone done a Flemish doe / mini-rex buck cross? I can't really find anything about it on theweb... so I'm wondering if I should just bite the bullet and change up my bucks...
2) As much as I've read up on kindling and nest boxes etc... I'm just not convinced that it will be enough. Does anyone live in Ottawa, Ontario? Have yoiu let them kindle outdoors in the dead of winter? in a hutch?
3) My kids have been gathering leaves / grass etc.. to "make hay" so I've got about a bale worth of dried grass they've collected and dried over the last few weeks - and one of my girls suggested, since I sometimes give the rabbits a hosta leaf or two, that before the frost totally hits, we should gather up the rest and dry them in bunches as if they were herbs... question is, has anyone dried hosta plants to feed rabbits over the winter? Right now I have the kids' grass... I have bunches of dandelion greens... bunches of raspberry leaves... I've just plucked out all the leftovers of my strawberry plants and hung those last night to dry...
Anyway - any and all advice about anything is appreciated... my husband is of NO help... he's not a computer guy, he's a "tell me what you want" kind of guy... so...
We live in the suburbes, so it's kind of...well... hush hush and on the down lo, because technically, it's not 100%.
In any case - at the end of the day, we have a variety of different hutches that my husband built from scratch, which are insulated etc... the rabbits permanent homes, they're to be kept outdoors only.
(unless of course, something happens where their basic health and safety requires them to be kept indoors for a time...)
We currently have 3 flemish giant does, and 2 mini rex bucks.
My husband heard me say "rex"... I meant standard... he was sweet, he went to pick them up for me... got 2 mini rex bucks instead. They're less than a 1/4 of the size... how's that even going to work?? :lol: :lol:
My loving dum dum. :lol: :lol:
So - we're at the point right now where we're well enough set up that we're looking to start actually breeding them now.
1) Has anyone done a Flemish doe / mini-rex buck cross? I can't really find anything about it on theweb... so I'm wondering if I should just bite the bullet and change up my bucks...
2) As much as I've read up on kindling and nest boxes etc... I'm just not convinced that it will be enough. Does anyone live in Ottawa, Ontario? Have yoiu let them kindle outdoors in the dead of winter? in a hutch?
3) My kids have been gathering leaves / grass etc.. to "make hay" so I've got about a bale worth of dried grass they've collected and dried over the last few weeks - and one of my girls suggested, since I sometimes give the rabbits a hosta leaf or two, that before the frost totally hits, we should gather up the rest and dry them in bunches as if they were herbs... question is, has anyone dried hosta plants to feed rabbits over the winter? Right now I have the kids' grass... I have bunches of dandelion greens... bunches of raspberry leaves... I've just plucked out all the leftovers of my strawberry plants and hung those last night to dry...
Anyway - any and all advice about anything is appreciated... my husband is of NO help... he's not a computer guy, he's a "tell me what you want" kind of guy... so...